Sumitomo (SHI) Demag is restructuring its moulding machine manufacturing network by selling its Indian joint venture stake and focusing its all-electric machine construction on Wiehe in Germany.
The Indian joint venture, with Larsen & Toubro, was set up in 2001 with the aim of building small and medium-size machines for the domestic market and for export. It operated from Chennai as L&T-Demag Plastics Machinery. The stake in the joint venture was taken over by Sumitomo when it bought Demag in March last year and has now been sold to its partner L&T. SHI says it has a plan to set up its own subsidiary in India.
The changes at Wiehe are part of a Eur 50 million investment in Sumitomo (SHI) Demag which the company’s Dr Tetsuya Okamura said was a “strategic decision which we have taken against the background of the current market crisis, to maintain and to strengthen both Demag plants in Schwaig and Wiehe.” He said the company was expecting a strong and early demand for smaller all-electric injection moulding machines globally once the markets recover.
The Wiehe plant was set up in the early ’90s specifically to build small machines using assembly track methods. The IntElect all-electric machine is built there, and now it is also to make the Sumitomo SE range from Japan as a “centre of excellence for all-electric injection moulding machines.”
Source: britishplastics.co.uk
